Ranging marsupials against mutton

NOT ONE of Australia's national parks is large enough to protect all the species of animals it contains, according to a leading expert on the continent's flora and fauna.

Urgent action is needed, says Mike Archer, Director of the Australian Museum and a professor of biology at the University of New South Wales. "Ours is the last generation that will have the chance to head off what seems certain to be a biological catastrophe," he told a Horizons of Science forum at the University of Technology, Sydney last week. Archer called for a fifth of Australia to be set aside for the recovery and restoration of the nation's biological resourcesin chunks of at least 300 000 square kilometres representing each broad type of habitat.

His approach would require the phasing out of grazing sheep and cattle on rangelands. Archer estimates that this activity alone causes land degradation costing billions of ...

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